Coppola to get Lifetime Achievement Oscar

AUGUST 26, 2010 - The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS) has announced that it will present a lifetime achievement Oscar to movie-maker Francis Ford Coppola (pic) to add to his stack of five Academy Awards.

Coppola, 71, who won most of his five Oscars for The Godfather series, also wrote and directed Vietnam War movie Apocalypse Now and the 1974 thriller The Conversation. He will receive the Irving Thalberg Memorial Award at a dinner in November in Los Angeles, ahead of the main Oscar ceremony in February 2011.

The lifetime achievement award is given to "a creative producer whose body of work reflects a consistently high quality of motion picture production."

Coppola was also credited for launching the career of Star Wars creator George Lucas when he produced Lucas's first two feature films, "THX 1138" and American Graffiti."

Honorary Oscars will also be handed out to French director Jean-Luc Godard, whose films include Breathless and The Seven Deadly Sins; character actor Eli Wallach, 94, and film historian and documentary maker Kevin Brownlow.

"Each of these honorees has touched movie audiences worldwide and influenced the motion picture industry through their work," AMPAS president Tom Sherak said in a statement. "It will be an honour to celebrate their extraordinary achievements and contributions."